The Orange County Museum of Art announced on Wednesday, Aug. 31, five diverse, multimedia exhibitions for its fast approaching opening at the Segerstrom Center for the Arts. 

The museum first opened in 1962 as the Balboa Pavilion Gallery and has since undergone several transformations leading to the $93 million, 53,000-square-foot marvel CEO and Director Heidi Zuckerman calls the “last piece of the cultural puzzle” at the Costa Mesa arts hub. 

Joining a sect of fine arts museums that have begun to reimagine the visitors’ experience as increasingly immersive and inclusive of surrounding architecture, OCMA has curated an opening event that will allow visitors to engage with both traditional artwork and more experimental media, with a diverse set of artists represented.

Along with pieces pulled from its own massive collection, attendees of the museum’s grand opening – a 24-hour affair beginning at 5 p.m. Oct. 8 – will view exhibits ranging from a 24-foot-wide by 16-foot-tall outdoor sculpture to a minimalist garden landscape. A variety of Southern California artists will be highlighted.

“It’s trying to set the tone that art takes many forms,” Zuckerman said of the opening event’s curation. “Presenting an exhibition where the work may not look like what people are associating with art, I think, is a really important guidepost for our future.”

To move toward that future, though, Zuckerman believes the museum must honor its past – hence one of the themes of the October program: “Looking back to look forward.”

Beginning in the 1980s, the California Biennial – originally coined the Newport Biennial – regularly spotlighted contemporary artists from around the state, though it hasn’t run since 2017 due to the museum’s pending expansion. 

The tradition returns for the museum’s opening with “California Biennial 2022: Pacific Gold,” organized by OCMA’s former curator Elizabeth Armstrong. The artworks constituting the exhibit were collected through more than 100 studio visits spanning the Golden State.

“Revisiting mythical stories and reimagining California as a changing land, ‘California Biennial 2022: Pacific Gold’ presents a set of distinctive voices, ones which question, challenge and animate the past, while looking to the future,” officials said in describing the opening exhibit. 

Another opening exhibit announced Wednesday that will be paying homage to the past is “13 Women,” curated by Zuckerman. It commemorates the female visionaries who founded the first iteration of OCMA some 60 years ago. 

Its planning dates back to her early interviews for the CEO position.

“The head of the acquisitions committee said, ‘I know you don’t really know the collection yet, but if you were going to do a show, what would you do?’” Zuckerman said. In what she called a strike of “divine inspiration,” she replied with the pitch that has since defined the tone of OCMA’s opening. 

“Sometimes your first idea isn’t your best idea, but this one really stuck,” Zuckerman said, adding she’s always committed to “championing the work of female artists and artists of color, not as a flag-waver, but because the work is great.” 

“13 Women” will run the longest of the five opening exhibitions, though it will evolve several times over its year-long run. While the work of 13 women will be on display at all times, the artists featured  will rotate so “there will always be something new to see,” Zuckerman said. 

Arts organizations throughout the county have applauded OCMA’s efforts to foreground work by underrepresented artists, such as including “13 Women” in its opening programming. 

“Women artists have not received the same degree of attention over the years, and it’s wonderful to see them doing that,” lauded Richard Stein, president and CEO of the independent nonprofit arts council Arts Orange County. “I have no doubt that they will showcase artists of color and otherwise represent the diversity of Orange County.” 

“They’re really taking into account how to bring in diverse voices,” echoed Tyler Stallings, director of Orange Coast College’s Frank M. Doyle Arts Pavilion. 

Zuckerman said she plans to honor the county’s increasingly diverse experiences and vantage points with this opening and future programming. 

“Part of what we’re doing is mining our own history and telling our own stories slightly differently,” she said, sharing that OCMA previously worked with opening exhibitor Fred Eversley in 1978, when it was still the Newport Harbor Art Museum, and eagerly anticipates a new opportunity to revel in his genius. 

Eversley’s multimedia installation “Reflecting Back (the World),” which speaks to his firsthand technical understanding as a former NASA consulting engineer, explores the optical properties of a black hole and “exemplifies Eversley’s interest in challenging notions of perception to offer new perspectives on the world we inhabit,” OCMA officials describe. 

OCMA’s opening will also leverage the museum’s abundant plaza space. Sanford Biggers’ colossal sculpture “Of many waters,” coated in sequins, will glisten in kinetic magnificence as passersby cycle in and out of the museum. In addition, Peter Walker’s “Minimalist Landscape” will fashion a modern pedestrian plaza where museum goers, theater enthusiasts, and business people, alike, may interact.

Including robust outdoor experiences in OCMA’s design is just one way Zuckerman plans to make the museum experience more accessible. She’s also shared photos of the museum’s construction progress regularly on social media, trained all frontline staff in emotional intelligence, and secured a $2.5 million donation that makes admission free to the public for the next 10 years – all in the hopes of making OCMA a safe and inviting environment. 

“A 21st century museum is a place where everyone feels welcome,” she said. “I really want everyone to feel like this is their museum.”